Corruption is a central theme in both the films Q&A by Sidney Lumet and in the 1979 film The Onion Field by Harold Becker. Neither film portrays this theme as positive by any stretch, but they both have interestings things to say about corruption and how it is utilized in the films. As a quick plot synopsis recap, Q&A is a film that follows assistant district attorney Al Reilly (Timothy Hutton) as he is tasked with conducting a Q&A to determine the validity of a shootout conducted by detective Mike Brennan (Nick Nolte). As Al gets closer to the truth, he is pulled into a controversy involving his former girlfriend, a gangster, and the police captain. By the end of the film, Al does not find resolution or a satisfying conclusion to the story laid out in the story, but he does realize the importance of how he prioritizes things in his life. On the other hand, The Onion Field is a film which follows three characters, Det. Karl Hettinger (John Savage), Gregory Powell (John Woods), and Jimmy Smith (Franklyn Seales) before, during, and after the murder of Det. Ian Campbell (Ted Danson). The film follows the case as it unfolds, and concludes with the two criminals able to whittle down their death sentences to life ones. Ultimately, the film ends with Hettinger finding a new lease on life and the two criminals finding solace in their respective prison lives. Now both these films primarily deal with different kinds of corruption. Q&A mainly deals with literal corruption, primarily meaning financials while The Onion Field deals in moral corruption. In this feature post, corruption will be analyzed in the context of both films, complete with a comparison at the conclusion . In Q&A, corruption is viewed as deeply dirty, more so than typical. This is best evidenced by the fact that two of the most corrupt individuals in the film are members of a high moral institution, one meant to enforce the law. The obvious takeaway of this is that no one is impervious or not susceptible to corruption, which is so enticing that even high-ranking police officers can be embroiled in it. While it may by easy for many to assume that corruption is an issue that only exists in institutions or with individuals who are already rich or with access to large amounts of money. However, this is not true. For policemen, who are underpaid but given a great deal of authority, corruption often flourishes (particularly in big city departments). The director Sidney Lubert shines a spotlight on these issues in the film, exposing the underlying ugliness often found in big city precincts if one pays close enough attention. True, the system is not completely morally bankrupt, but both an idol-like detective aswell as the police corruption work with criminals to make more money and get ahead, all while ignoring the values they swore to uphold as civil servants. In this way, corrupt officials betray the trust placed in them by not only citizens, but by fellow officers aswell. A corrupt policeman conveys that their loyalty, their actions, and their trust can be bought which destabilizes the force, causing everyone to doubt the oath they took and question it's security. Q&A should be applauded for its handling of corruption as a theme. This movie truly helps the audience to realize how deadly of a weapon corruption really is and how money can negatively affect people. Yet the film also argues that there are good people not willing to accept corruption. These are people to whom rules hold significance and value to them. Money is important to everyone, but to many more than we might think, not worth sacrificing their good name and word. Corruption is portrayed differently in The Onion Field which mainly deals with issues of moral corruption. Yet there are two different kinds seen in the film. Moral corruption in terms of being willing to kill someone or run away from said crime, and moral corruption in terms of deterioration of morals. Det. Karl Hettinger experiences the latter over the course of the film. Greg Ferrara of the Streamline blog excellently illustrates the how John Savage portrays this moral corruption by stating, "The acting throughout is excellent from all concerned. John Savage uses his distant gaze to great advantage to express the emotional struggles of his character. Although he does occasionally suffer an emotional release, he mainly uses his eyes to convey anguish, glancing away, downward, as if afraid to look anyone in the eye after what he’s done, or, at least, what he thinks he’s done". To expand upon what was said, John Savage acts progressively more distant in the film to display the moral toll that failing to save his partner had taken on him. This ultimately results in him taking up shoplifting, contemplating suicide, and resigning from the police force. Much like how corruption is used in Q&A, corruption does not always seek out obvious targets. Much like how one might believe the police department is exempt from corruption, one might also believe that criminals are the only ones who can be morally corrupt. This type of corruption has weight to it however, and teaches an important lesson. One is that corruption can stem from a dissatisfaction from within. Another is that moral corruption is something that can be overcome. As someone goes through life, they experience change. Some are positive and some are negative. More often than not, the negative ones morally corrupt a person, fundamentally changing who they are for the worst. Yet by offering a solution to this issue, The Onion Field pushes the message that there is hope for people feeling like they have been corrupted. If they work to better themselves, use the tools given, and try to improve then they eventually will. This in particular is a narrative few films pursue or embrace which makes this movie both effective and unique in its portrayal of the subject matter. In conclusion, Q&A and The Onion Field promote a message warning against the dangers of corruption, but they both address these in different ways. The former attacks corruption by saying that there will always be those to fight against it, while the latter argues that there is redemption from it. Ultimately, both tout that while everyone and everything is susceptible to corruption, it is not an invulnerable issue. Both films teach the audience an important lesson in this message. It teaches not to give up, especially if the viewer themself is corrupt, but to try to work towards moving past it. As can be seen in the film The Onion Field, Hettinger was much happier with his life after he tried to fix his issues rather than giving into his corrupt temptations. Few other films would tackle the issue of corruption in the way that this pairing of movies does and audiences should be thankful of that. In a world where people too often look at things as black-and-white, it is refreshing to see storylines in which a bad guy can become good. The stories are made more realistic and relatable in that way. This gives people hope for the future and the part they play in said future. Truly, corruption is a hydra, but it is one that warriors will never cease to battle against.
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3/31/2019 0 Comments Power: claimed or Earned?Power is a strong element prevalent in two particular films, Casablanca by Michael Curtiz and The Good German by Steven Soderbergh. Despite this link, these films have far more in common and these links have been examined at nauseum. However, this post will feature on the exclusive analyzation of the part power plays in both these stories, how is compares and contrasts, how effective its used, and how it strengthens the message of the story. To quickly recap the plots of both movies, Casablanca was a film that follows Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) as he runs a cantina in French Morocco during WWII. Rick's life is shaken up when he is given blank passports that both the Nazis and his old lover both desperately want. In the end, Rick puts everything on the line, even giving up his own security, to ensure that his former lover Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) could escape Morocco. On the other hand, The Good German is a film about Jake Geismar (George Clooney), a US war correspondent sent to Berlin after the end of the war with Nazi Germany in WWII. Controversy is stirred up when Jake discovers that his driver, Tully (Tobey Maguire) is dating his old flame Lena Brandt (Cate Blanchett). When Tully's body is discovered dead, Jake investigates the murder and unveils a conspiracy involving Ilsa's husband and Nazi scientists, that exposes her as someone who helped them capture Jews to save herself. Much like Rick, Jake stays behind and simply watches as his former love interest flies off. Now, power is a big element in both these films, even if it does appear to be more in the background. Three primary characters exemplify power in Casablanca, and each of them represent different kinds of power. First there's Rick, who represents the power of mystery and neutrality. Rick's whole character is that he does not commit himself to any one ideology or side beyond that of his own neutrality. Thus, he exudes power because no one truly understands him, and this gives him the element of surprise which he can use to his advantage. However, he is also powerful, because he allows himself to draw aid from anyone he wants due to his shaky loyalty and his financially dominant position. Louis Renault (Claude Rains) is another character that exemplifies power due to his position as captain of the city police. Louis often leverages his position in order to gain bribes, whether it be financial or favor form. Louis always does whatever it takes to be a part of the winning team which will ensure that he can never fail. Finally, Major Heinrich Strasser (Conrad Veidt) wields power as the man who is truly in charge of Morocco. The Nazis control France and thus, they control the French. Heinrich uses his authority to achieve many feats, and while he does not have flexible loyalty or mystery that allows him the freedom to do anything, he holds a high position in the side that makes the rules and this gives him power over everyone within the setting of the film. Heinrich wields lawful power, Rick wields individual power, and Louis wields circumstantial power. Power is used in this movie to display complexity in that people of wildly different life positions can be important in different regards for different reasons. Truly, Casablanca displays that power is not limited to any one type of person. To this point, the film is very effective in convincing the audience that power is a complex element that can be drawn from multiple sources simultaneously. Power is also a key to forwarding the story's narrative. Without the elements of differentiating forms of power and how they clash, the primary theme of 'letting go of the past' would not be portrayed as masterfully as it is in the film because it would appear easy. Yet everyone knows that letting go of past turmoil is anything but easy, and Rick's struggle with different types of authority really drives home this point. Rick can be as abrasive as he wants, but defying the law, especially the Nazis, is not something one can get away with easy or for long. Power as displayed in The Good German is both quite similar and different to Casablanca. Jake has to contend with government bureaucracy much like Rick did, but as Tully proves, power is what you make of it. Tully claimed power from his situation, turning the despair of others in war-torn Germany into his gain, despite being a lowly soldier. In this film, power is portrayed as something that is seized rather than handed out. Power comes from a title or rank sure, but to enjoy the full extent of one's authority, extra steps must be taken. Ranks can limit someone if they allow them to, but understanding their place in public like Tully does, allows them to deceive those who are their better by rank, but their equal otherwise. Despite this, Tully has a violent demeanor which allows him to be exploited. Really, it is Lena who wields a discrete power over him. Brian Eggert elaborates on this idea in his review of the film in which he states, "Maguire’s portrayal of Tully is brutal, violent, and generally aggressive, as it’s assumed that he’s been corrupted by the need to survive in Berlin. Though his character’s penchant for violence is never fully explained, Lena suggests his behaviors are the actions of a “boy.” Jake gets personally involved when he discovers Tully and Brandt are now lovers, but doesn’t realize that they’re only lovers because Lena is using him. Lena uses everyone. She sells herself to survive. She endures with Tully even though he beats her. Anything—she’ll do anything to survive and eventually get out of Berlin. Lena doesn’t take pride this behavior; it’s simply a fact of life in postwar Berlin—you do what you need to in order to survive. Berlin corrupts". The Good German proves that power is seldom all-encompassing, rather, different people hold power over eachother all the time, but often in different ways. Ultimately where Casablanca is focused on power as a tool to be used by anyone, that it must be earned. The Good German expresses a different belief, that power is claimed. The difference being that one type of person gains respect over time by building up their reputation and their efficiency, Yet those who claim power in The Good German do so by exploiting loopholes or situations and drawing power from that. Overall, this film is very effective in how it presents power, doing so in a very believable and understandable way. Power pairs well with the central element of the movie, which is that really knowing a person means finding out all their darkness. The film goes onto address how characters deal with the fact that they understand each other and all their sins. Yet power in The Good German strengthens the film's primary driver/element by complimenting it. Power is used as a tool to display corruption of the characters and their morality, as addressed by Brian Eggert. Without using power the way it does, The Good German would lose a great deal of its persuasion because the corruption would appear to be far less directed and poorly established. With the inclusion of power, the viewer can plainly see how corruption plays an important part in transforming the characters and moving the plot of the story forward. Now to compare and contrast the use of power in both films. As previously stated, power in Casablanca is earned whereas in The Good German it is claimed. Both films use power to display that anyone can wield it. It is not just something that people with legal authority enjoy, but truly, people of all types and stations. Additionally. both films effectively communicate to the audience that power can either strengthen or corrupt an individual and that it is capable of great change. However, the two movies take the concept of power in different directions. Casablanca ultimately argues that true power is the strength to admit when a cause is more important than one's own well being and acting on that notion. The Good German retorts by suggesting that power is constantly fleeting and that what one character interprets as them being powerful another can interpret as weakness. Power is perception. There is a connection between these two different understandings of power. By admitting that true power comes when one becomes aware, Casablanca inadvertently worships perception as the main effect of power element. Power is achieved based on individual quirks, intelligence, and luck. Both films do an excellent job at embodying this philosophy which convinces the audience that power is not resting at the top of the latter, but is more akin to a pool. Power floats around, constantly changing and never remaining solely in one person's hands or in their location. Both films effectively argue that power is what the wielder makes of it. One man's interpreted weakness can be seen as strength by another, and vice versa. Despite it not being an overt film in either film, power is element as a major factor in both when the viewer steps back and takes a general look at both. The interesting philosophies present on power do well in pulling in the audience and captivating them, stimulating their minds. Truly, fortune favors the bold, and by watching these two films and looking at how power is illustrated, power will seem not so far away from whichever viewer desires it.
2/27/2019 1 Comment Wealth: The Secret to Happiness?In both A Simple Plan (1998) by Sam Raimi and Courtney Hunt's film Frozen River (2009) is money is major plot point and motivation for the characters. Despite this, each film's stance on money differs greatly and each of the film's protagonists are in very different circumstances. So how exactly is wealth used in both these films? How do these films compare and contrast in their usage of this major topic and how does it affect both films? That is what will be analyzed in this feature post. As a short recap, A Simple Plan follows Hank (Bill Paxton), a well-liked financially stable soon-to-be father who winds up finding an abandoned bag of money containing millions of dollars alongside his brother Jacob (Billy Bob Thornton) and Jacob's friend Lou (Brent Briscoe). Hank comes up with a plan whee they split the money and will eventually leave town in order to avoid being caught. As time progresses, the initial plan Hank formulated unravels more and more as complications continuously arrive. Eventually, Hank ends up burning the money, after having lost almost everything in a final effort not to be found out by the police. Alternatively, Frozen River is focused on Ray Eddy (Melissa Leo), a low class mother struggling to make ends meet in order to find a better house for her family while also acquiring funds to pay her bills. Eventually, ray teams up with a local Mohawk woman, Lila Littlewolf (Misty Upham), and the two partner up for a number of smuggling jobs so that Ray can raise the funds she needs for a new home before she loses her deposit. Ultimately however, Ray and Lila are found out. Lila is exiled from her tribe and Ray is taken to prison. However, Ray is finally able to afford the house, which is delivered in the last scene of the film. Now, this analysis will focus on both films individually, examining how they treat the concept of money and finally, the two films will be compared in their respective takes and compared. Is Simple Plan is all about money, but it is skewered through a negative lens. While almost all the characters can think of nothing but how the extra money will improve their lives, throughout the course of the movie it truly does nothing but ruin their lives. This movie is not about people who desperately need money to survive, it is about people who want it to improve their lives. While the extra finance would certainly improve the lives of Lou and Jacob, they have been comfortable in their roles for long enough without needing it. As for Hank and his wife, Sarah (Bridget Fonda), their interest in the money is purely greedy in nature. In A Simple Plan the prospect of the money is never truly treated in a favorable light. All the characters want it, yes, but none of them have a truly well-thought out plan about how they are going to use it.More work is put into making sure that they keep the money and don't get caught rather than why each of them actually need the money for. This is perhaps best portrayed in the scene between Jacob and Hank in which Jacob claims that he will use his share to buy back the abandoned family farm. Yet Hank tries to tell Jacob that running a farm all on his own, with little-to-no real knowledge about how it completely operates is a poor idea. However, Jacob does not listen and accuses Hank of trying to keep him down. Despite all this, Hank is right; Jacob wants to pursue his dream but is unaware of, or uncaring of, any practical ways to get the farm up and running as well as keeping it that way. The concept of money in the film also corrupts the characters, Hank seems to change significantly throughout the course of the film before coming full circle at the end. Yet the money changes Sarah the most. At first, Sarah rejects the concept of taking the money when Hank presents it as a hypothetical scenario but later becomes the most morally corrupt of them all. She encourages Hank to frame someone for murder as well as cover up murders and keep the money even when the two discover that the millions are not drug money as they initially believed, but ransom money. David Ng perhaps encapsulates Sarah's character best in his review when he states, "[a] Simple Plan conceives its characters as Elizabethan plotters. When we first meet Sarah, she is wearing a red bathrobe. From her plush home, she engineers much of the film's action with a quiet urgency, like a Shakespearean temptress who whispers eloquently to her weaker husband and who propagates her sinisterism down the chain of command. Though Sarah doesn't commit any of the film's gruesome deeds, she is its coldest creation. While breast feeding her newborn daughter, she persuades Hank to trick Lou into confessing to a murder. Buy a tape recorder, she whispers, so you can secretly record the confession and turn it into the police." This description perfectly captures how Sarah is corrupted by the prospect of wealth. When she is first introduced, the audience thinks of her as nothing else but a potential new mother and this is completely turned on its head by the conclusion of the film as she desperately fights her husband to prevent him from burning his millions. Unlike Hank, she never mentally lets go of the wealth she lost. Ultimately. is money portrayed as the answer to all of the group's mostly imagined problems? No, it is not. Money does nothing but inflame tensions between the group and cause more problems for them, placing them in terrible situations they would never normally be in. Thus, the film argues that the prospect of acquiring a large amount of money is looked at as sinful and corrupting. The viewer is taught that greed leads to nothing but ruin. In short, one should be happy with what they have and not lust after something that seems good at first without deeper thought into how acquiring that may go. Much like A Simple Plan, Frozen River is centered around money. Ray needs money to buy a new home for her family which at first is a want rather than a need, but when her son later makes an unspecified mistake, it reduces the original home to being inhospitable. Ray works tirelessly to give her family what they want and what they need. She wants to make them comfortable; not make them dependent on eating popcorn for breakfast with the looming threat of losing items like their tv constantly. Ray reluctantly takes on smuggling in order to get a bit of money to secure her new home, but she continues to return to it over and over, much like Hank. The truly twisted element present is that at first, Lila ropes Ray into her smuggling scheme by tempting her with a net gain of over thousand dollars. Close to the end, Ray reverses this, pulling Lila, who is now working at a real job and uninterested in smuggling any longer, into "one last scheme" to earn the last bit of money Ray needs in order to finally reach her goal. In this film, money is portrayed both as great and essential as well as terrible. More specifically, like A Simple Plan it is technically the method by which one acquires wealth that should be critiqued rather than gaining money itself. Nevertheless, Frozen River displays that the prospect of earning money is corrupting. While the audience may root for Ray to succeed, at the end it truly dons at the viewer just how bad she really is. She broke the law repeatedly, lied, and chose to go to prison for months or potentially longer rather than give up her partner to stay with her kids. Yet that last point was a double-edge sword, was Ray a bad person for choosing to go to prison and leaving her children without their mother? Or was she a good one for changing her mind by not running and not allowing herself to sell-out Lila? The answer is that Ray's intentions were good, but her executions were bad. Perhaps she decided not to sell out Lila because she came to terms with the fact that she had developed a friendship with Lila, or perhaps she did so because she recognized where she was going and she needed to stop herself before she became irredeemable. For someone who had been quite evil for a good reason over the course of the film, Ray redeems herself by the end by accepting the consequences of her actions and reaping what she had sown. Richard Schickle perhaps describes Ray best when he says, "[t]here's nothing overtly heroic about her as she plods forward under her burden of her small-scale dreams. She's not cynical, but she's not expecting much, either. She's just knowing and accepting of what fate, good or bad, but never transformative, throws at her. You can see it in her eyes, in her wiry body's alertness to both danger and opportunity". In the end, the film portrays the means by which that Ray acquires her money was necessary, but deplorable. Sometimes people need to do bad things to for a good goal that may help even innocents, the film argues. Ray deserves the bad things that happen to her that she is responsible for, but her children do not, and thus, they do not share any of Ray's consequences. T.J. (Charlie Mcdermott) is even let off the hook of scamming an older woman early in the film while trying to help his family. In this, the viewer sees that T.J. made a single mistake out of desperation and did not take that bad behavior any further. However, Ray does continue to embark on bad ventures, which is why she suffers a punishment and her oldest son does not. Money does not corrupt T.J. because he recognizes his importance and only does what he needs to in order to provide for he and his brother as his mother tries to shut him out and give him a proper adolescence. Yet money does corrupt Ray, as she fights desperately for a home she does not technically need. While she could be putting that money towards consistent food and what-not, she chooses to continue smuggling to afford a home she does not actually need. In the end, she succeeds, but with consequences that may or may not be worth it to her. By not selling Lila out, the audience is led to believe that Ray accepts that the potential consequences of her actions, no matter what they are, our acceptable to her. By examining both these movies together, the reader can tell that money corrupts the main protagonist in both films. Hank changes from a man who does not need the money and only does so because his brother and friend pressure him into it, to a man who will do anything to keep it. Ray changes from a woman who will not resort to dubious means to acquire the money she needs, into someone who keeps coming back to that behavior and even convinces her former partner to embrace the lifestyle after leaving it; a chilling role-reversal. Ray is never morally corrupted, yet she suffers consequences for her actions while Hank is morally corrupted, but does not. While this aspect may be different, both characters experience a "redeeming" moment. Hank's is when he realizes just how deep in moral corruption he is, and despite options like leaving the country, decides to burn his money instead in order to cleanse himself of its corrupting effects. Ray's moment is when she decides not to abandon Lila, despite Lila telling her she can, in order to prove to herself that she understands a fellow mother's plight by recognizing that her struggle is not superior to another's. In the end of both films, neither character truly gets to see the "pay-off" of all their tireless efforts. With these facts, the viewer of these films can see that because these characters succumbed to dark means to acquire funds, they do not deserve rewards. Money is showcased not to equal happiness and the introduction of money to scenarios has startling results. When Sarah rants in A Simple Plan claiming that she needs Hank's millions in order to be happy in their marriage again, she is creating problems that can be solved with more money. She does not actually feel that way, but the proposition of gaining more wealth inspires her to subconsciously develop a reason to justify to herself why she should keep the millions. Yet because of this, even if Sarah was able to get the money like she wanted, neither she nor Hank would truly be happy due to the rift she created between them. By confessing that she is not truly happy with Hank the way things are in a moderately financed lifestyle, she has confessed that her feelings for her husband and their life together is heavily conditional and terribly insincere. In Frozen River, Ray is thrown into jail by the end and forced to surrender her children to a woman she really barely knows, even unable to view the house she pined so hard for. The last we she of Ray, she has accepted her fate but is anything but happy. Much like Hank, she lost everything important for her because of the prospect of extra money. The difference is, Ray's loss is temporary. Ultimately, this comparison proves that these films argue that more money does not equal more money. Happiness comes from within and while money may aid that purpose, it alone does not provide happiness. Money has a tendency to seduce and corrupt; driving people to think only of it and all the things they can buy with it. Yet as many learn far to late. one cannot buy love, nor happiness and like all things; money should not be seen as the end-all-be-all, but a means to an end. Money is a weapon that helps people fight for what they love, yet they must be mindful that what they do with that weapon does not ruin whatever they are fighting for. Wield wealth like a sword, but know when to slash and when to scabbard. In the end, capital wealth initiates an end that hopefully leads to a happy and healthy future with the people someone cares about more than anything else.
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